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Thursday, July 13, 2006

Beads on the Brain

Yes, I am still alive. I am just dealing with a particularily nasty ear/sinus infection-one of the chronic joys of being me. I have been suffering since Saturday and just today looked sick enough that my doc walked in and said "You look like you are in pain." when she saw me. (One of the huge downfalls of having a very high pain tolerance is that by the time someone realizes you are ill, it's gone beyind the mild stage.)

Anyway, enough whining. Let's talk ART!! Awhile back, I was looking at books on Amazon, seeing what was new and in the course of surfing, discovered a book called "A String and a Prayer". It looked really interesting so I put in a request for my library to purchase it and then promptly forgot all about it. (If you remember I am stealthily building up the mixed media section of my local library, one book at a time. *grin*)

(There would be a picture here if blogger would cooperate!!)So yesterday I got an email notification that "A String and a Prayer" had arrived. YAY! So on my way to get my perscription filled, I stopped in at the library and picked it up. It's a great little book about making and using prayer beads. Now I am a spiritual person (in no way religious) and I have always thought prayer beads were interesting, mainly as a personal thing that would help you focus your energy in creating your intentions. I think sometimes with everything that goes on in our daily lives, it's hard to find that quiet still place inside yourself and I think prayer beads might be a good way to help facilitate that.

The book talks about all the different world religions that use prayer beads and what materials are used for the beads, what the significance of the number of beads mean and also the symbolism behind the colours used. It was really, really interesting. It also gave simple instruction about stringing prayer beads into the various traditional forms that people use. There were stories about why people made prayer bead strings and the effect they had on the people they gave them to.

I just really liked the idea that you could make strings specifically for say someone who is ill, as a tangible way to show your are sending them your love and good thoughts for their healing. Can you imagine how deeply touching it would be to be on the receiving end of that? I think that could be a very powerful gift.

The only thing I missed from the book is for there to be some instruction on how to make handmade beads from a variety of materials. Perhaps I can source out some ideas for that online though. I like the idea of making the beads too. Maybe I should check out polymer clay? I don't know anything about it.

Anyway, I thought I would share this with you all, mainly because as you can imagine, it's hard to make art when I am feeling so awful and I thought this was a very interesting idea. I have a friend who is very close to my heart and I would like to make and send her something special for the 5th anniversary of 9/11 and this might just be it. Now I just need to think about what types of beads I would like to use.

I have this book and I love it. I have made several "prayer" bead pieces and actually have a bag of prayer beads (somewhere) from a swap that need to be strung up.Be sure to share if you make anything.HUGS

This sounds like an awesome book! I love learning about different religions, and I think that the history behind the different types of prayer beads would be most fascinating. I'm going to have to take a look for this book myself!

I think that the idea of making assorted prayer beads would be a great swap project, don't you??